subject: Leading judge unveils Twitter concerns [print this page] Leading judge unveils Twitter concerns Leading judge unveils Twitter concerns
Twitter is really a modern trend that has already been fiercely argued by a selection of people as well as companies right from world wide. The country's top judge has warned that misuse of the internet throughout tests can threaten the future of the jury system.
Lord Judge, the Lord Chief Justice, fears that court-based tweeting increases the chance of a mistrial. He explained it had been too simple for campaigners to saturate the micro-blogging website with messages in the bid to influence jurors.
The most senior judge inside England and Wales is additionally searching for more difficult warnings for jurors over internet use. The Lord Chief Justice stated that "We cannot stop people tweeting, but if jurors look at such material, the risks to the fairness of the trial will be very serious, and ultimately the openness of the trial process on which we all rely would be damaged," he explained.
"We have to remember that tweets stay on the internet and to allow court-based tweeting is likely to increase the potential for prejudicial material regarding a defendant or a witness to become available on the internet."
He added: "We welcome advances in technology, provided that we are its masters and it is our tool and servant."
Lord Judge inquired whether the text-based transmission associated with material from a courtroom needs to be prohibited, saying he can find simply no statutory prohibition about its use, yet tape recordings ended up prohibited under the Contempt of Court Act.
"Why is Twitter in the form of text-based transmission of material from court any different?" he asked. This kind of query has yet to be determined, and the choice might have a large influence on our own processes.
To resolve this issue there are numerous challenges which will have to be fixed on numerous levels. If however this results in being illegal to tweet if you are part of the jury throughout a trial it may put people off. The only issue with this is that monitoring twitter becomes necessary and there's so much to observe.
